Over the years, the Web has become a premier source of information in almost every area we can think about. When considering tourism, the Web became the primary source of information for travelers. When planning trips, people search for information about destinations, accommodations, attractions, means of transportation, in short, everything related to their future trip. Once done searching they reserve almost everything online. The blessing of the easily accessible information comes with the curse of information overload. Here where Web search techniques and recommendation systems come into play. This is especially true recently with the appearance of COVID-19 and the uncertainty and transformative power it brings traveling. WebTour 2021 will bring together researchers and practitioners working on developing and improving tools and techniques for improving users’ ability to better find relevant information that matches their needs.
Topics of Interest (but not limited to):
- Systems, applications and novel techniques
- Information search in travel and tourism
- Recommendation systems for travel and tourism
- Route planning and trip recommendation
- Data integration methods
- Case studies and evaluation
- User modeling in tourism
- Travelers preference elicitation
- Context and mobility
- Information needs, information access and search patterns
- Cold-start problem in tourist information search
- Interaction concepts with personal and group displays
- Personalized explanations and feedback of recommendation systems
- Digital storytelling and narratives
- Networks, governance and policy
- Analysis of networks in tourism
- Novel ICT and its impact on travel and tourism
- Sustainability of the tourism ecosystem
- Travel and tourism in the COVID-19 and post-covid era